Wednesday, December 11, 2013

This email is being circulated around the world~~~please keep it going.

When
a soldier comes home, he finds it hard......to listen to his son whine
about being bored.

....to keep a straight face when people complain about potholes.

To be tolerant
of people who complain about the hassle of getting ready for work.

...to be
understanding when a co-worker complains about a bad night's sleep.

...to be silent
when people pray to God for a new car.

...to control
his panic when his wife tells him he needs to drive slower.

..to be
compassionate when a businessman expresses a fear of flying.

....to keep from
laughing when anxious parents say they're afraid to send their kids off
to summer camp.

....to keep from
ridiculing someone who complains about hot weather.

....to control
his frustration when a colleague gripes about his coffee being cold.

....to remain
calm when his daughter complains about having to walk the dog.

.....to be civil
to people who complain about their jobs.

.....to just walk
away when someone says they onlyget two weeks of vacation a year.

...to be
forgiving when someone says how hard it is to have a new baby in the
house.

The only thing harder than being a Soldier...

Is loving one.

I was asked to pass this on and I will gladly do so!! Will you???

No one has been
able to explain to me why young men and women serve in the U.S.
Military for 20 years, risking their lives protecting freedom, and only
get 50% of their pay on retirement. While Politicians hold their
political positions, in the safe confines of the capital, protected by
these same men and women, and receive full-pay retirement after serving
one term. It just does not make any sense.

If each person
who receives this will forward it on to 20 people, in three days, most
people in The United States
of America will have the message. This is
one proposal that really should be passed around. Proposed28th Amendment to the United States Constitution: "Congress shall
make no law that applies to the citizens of the United States that does not apply equally to
the Senators and/or Representatives; and, Congress shall make no law that
applies to the Senators and/or Representatives that does not apply
equally to the citizens of the United States."

You
are one of my 20+. I passed it on, will you? "If you
choose not to decide, you still have made a choice," and these brave
soldiers have given you that choice.

Monday, December 9, 2013

My personal rule has always been, "Do not interrupt the person you are talking with for someone else." Unless. of course, it's the boss, or my kid (or her mom) with an emergency. After that, flames, not smoke, and only for arterial blood.

I watched a fair number of folks get real uncomfortable when I ignored my phone and continued our conversation. I never actually timed anyone, but my best guess is that it was less than a minute before I was asked "Aren't you going to get that?"

I suspect that anxiety is behind the compulsion to be in constant contact (and not the other way around, as stated above). So I suspect that some people are just not comfortable in their own skin.

Tuesday, December 3, 2013

The hardwired difference between male and female brains could explain why men are 'better at map reading'

And why women are 'better at remembering a conversation'

It's what, I think, most people have known all along (in the intuitive sense, anyway). And if the theory of mis-wiring in autistic kids is substantiated, it blows the hell out of the "inoculations cause autism" theory.Thank God!!From the U.K. Independent, via Rodger!

Saturday, November 9, 2013

Bay Bridge's mysterious protector out of hiding

The troll, who has no name, was created and surreptitiously installed in 1989

on
a quickly fabricated section of bridge deck that replaced the pieces
that collapsed in the Loma Prieta earthquake. He remained out of sight -
only bridge workers and boaters could see him on the north side of the
span - and cast his magic to protect the bridge and its users. In early
September, when the new eastern span opened, the troll was spirited away
by ironworkers, who wanted to make sure he was free before demolition
of the old span began. - - SFGate

Thursday, November 7, 2013

Apparently, someone at Disney/Pixar decided to upgrade Princess Merida for the Disney "Princess" collection. So, she's a bit older, and a bit curvier, which can happen when girls grow up. Watching a daughter turn into a young woman can be startling (if not downright shocking), but that's what they do! Especially if, like me, you put a kid on an airplane, and four months later the young woman returns in her place. Sadly, growing up to be attractive seems deemed 'sexualization' by the feminist cohort. But it's what little girls (and little boys) do.

The most quoted critic is the film's former co-director, Brenda Chapman, who was replaced during the film's production.(See the UK's Guardian and The Hollywood Reporter for more.)

From all the heat, light and noise, you'd think Disney had let Merida go the route of Miley Cyrus.Speaking of whom, I couldn't find quite the same outrage about her VMA appearance as I did about Merida. Here are my searches at the Guardian and the Reporter. Yes, there were critical articles, but no one was espousing that Miley turn back to her Hanna Montana persona, either.

Silly me. I still think beauty in any form should be celebrated, not denigrated. Yes, not every girl will grow up to be a Hollywood "princess" (which is actually a Good Thing). And not every boy will grow up to be a leading man, which is also good. Parents need to instill a solid sense of self-worth (not self-esteem) in their children, and teach them how to be the best person they can be. I have seen both men and women who are outside of the leading man/princess ideal, who have learned to be their best, and who present themselves quite well. As a result, I find them handsome or attractive.

Tuesday, October 29, 2013

For 10 years, a Minnesota man has been selling T-shirts, mugs, and other
items with slogans like “Department of Homeland Stupidity” and “The
NSA: the only part of the government that listens.”

On Tuesday LibertyManiacs owner Dan McCall sued
those agencies, arguing that he has a First Amendment right to parody
the DHS, the NSA, and other government offices, and that he should be
allowed to use the relevant seals.

Monday, October 28, 2013

Researchers at United States Holocaust
Memorial Museum have just released documentation that astounds even the
most informed scholars steeped in the previously known statistics of
German atrocities. Here is some of what has now been conclusively
discovered:

There were more than 42,500 Nazi ghettos and camps throughout Europe from 1933 to 1945.

There were 30,000 slave labor camps; 1,150 Jewish ghettos; 980
concentration camps; 1000 prisoner of war camps; 500 brothels filled
with sex slaves; and thousands of other camps used for euthanizing the
elderly and infirm, performing forced abortions, “Germanizing” prisoners
or transporting victims to killing centers.

The best estimate using current information available is 15to 20
million people who died or were imprisoned in sites controlled by the
Germans throughout the European continent.

The take away:

The “decent” people were somehow able to rationalize their silence.

I contacted the good Rabbi about his references. He was kind enough to answer. He said he had read about this in Erich Lichtblau's New York Times Sunday Review article on the Holocaust Museum's discoveries.

Sunday, October 20, 2013

I was reading an article on Tech Crunch about the tech debacle that is Obamacare, lamenting how start-ups were ready to have a go at it. It mentioned, in particular, eHealth, one of the few companies certified as a "web based entity" authorized to act as a alternative to government web sites. I got curious, and here's what I discovered.

My options for this year:

They say starting at $52/month, but...

...79 plans, starting at $209.75/month.

My options for next year:

eHealth estimates that I would get a subsidy of $451.00/month. (They
caveat the hell out of their numbers, solet's take this figure as a
SWAG* for now.)

Now, my premiums start (supposedly) at $192/month.

And I find a whopping thirteen plans, starting at $593.11/month, pre-subsidy. Post-subsidy, $142.11/month

I have no idea where they got the $52 and $192 numbers. After poking about a bit by changing ZIP codes, I found that they changed, but stayed the same when I changed birthdays. In any case, what's important is the final cost to me. And I didn't even try to figure out overall cost based on deductables, co-pays and such.